Wednesday, August 26, 2020

Vassafor - Vassafor III, To the Death (2020)


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New Zealand's soil is no stranger to dredging up some filthy and uncompromising death metal over the last few decades and Vassafor has always been at the forefront of this auditory barrage, along with the likes of Heresiarch, Diocletian, Witchrist, and Vesicant to name a few of the prominent forces within the Kiwi stratosphere.

Vassafor is one of my favourites out of the bunch, consistently being a barbaric force within the arena of death/black metal and with the newly released Vassafor III, To the Death I'm even more bullish. This album is a big breath of fresh air in a genre that sees a lot of futile attempts at invoking any real atmosphere, which Vassafor has done in spades on this record, giving lengthy songs ample room to move around a cavern of densely layered guitars, mollifying and calcified under the weight and plod of the drumming. Everything is recorded and produced perfectly, harkening to a much more underground sound, nothing plasticky or over-produced to be found on here, pure old-school filth and sonic evisceration that lends itself to be one of the better death metal albums of the year by my count. Absolute penetration!

Vassafor III, To the Death (bandcamp)

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